My mobile trills its old-fashioned telephone ring. Anxiety cackles in my ear when I see where the call is coming from.

Why is he ringing me? But I know why.

For a split second I think about not answering, but I know if I don’t he won’t stop trying. Each time I change my number I text him my new one but he rarely has cause to use it. Now he must have something important to say and he’ll be determined to say it.

I don’t want to hear it.

My toes scrunch inside of my slippers.

I don’t want to hear it.

The urge to run away is immense.

I don’t want to hear it.

I will myself to think of Archie upstairs.

Calm yourself.

I search the room for three things to ground myself with.

Chocolate-brown cushion with pops of orange flowers.

Green spider-plant on the windowsill.

The side lamp with its warming buttery glow.

Calm.

My phone falls quiet. I stare at my screen, waiting for the voicemail icon to pop up.

It doesn’t.

The ringing starts again, demanding attention. I mute the TV and peel off one of my gloves so I can swipe to accept the call but, rather than imagining germs, it is his words I can feel already crawling over my skin regardless of the fact he hasn’t yet spoken.

‘Yes?’ I don’t bother with hello. This is not a social call.

‘It’s Graham.’ His Scottish accent is broad although he hasn’t lived there for years.

‘I know.’ Although ‘Graham’ still seems too familiar. Chief Inspector McDonald is the name that flashed up on my phone. He’s retired now but I still can’t address him by his Christian name. Whenever I hear his voice I’m that eight-year-old girl once more, frightened and confused. Cowering in the brightness of the police station, the light and noise a stark contrast to the quiet darkness I’d been rescued from. My arms wrapped around my father’s neck – me on one hip, Marie on the other, while Chief Inspector McDonald – Graham – assured us, ‘I’ll find the bastards who did this, I promise,’ and my mother sobbed into a tissue, a bewildered Carly pressed against her side.

‘How are you?’ he asks although he’ll know how I am.

‘Fine,’ I say but we both know that I’m not.

We’re so horribly British, that it comes next, the idle chit-chat about the weather.

‘It’s brass monkeys out there, I can’t feel my hands,’ he says.

‘I know. I couldn’t spread the butter on Archie’s toast this morning because it was solid.’

We play I’m-colder-than-you tag for a few minutes more.

‘Leah.’ I know what’s coming even before he confirms that I am right. There’s no other reason he’d be calling me. Part of me thinks I should say it first, take some control, but my mouth is desert dry, the words stuck to my tongue. I hear his breath in my ear.

Please don’t tell me.

The sound of a chair leg scraping against the floor.